Richard94611 wrote:
Interesting article, probably valid data (I am not a statistician). But I can tell you from firsthand observation of a lot of people in my area of the country (the SF Bay Area) that a lot of people are convinced that the Republicans are anti-immigrant, anti-the -poor-and-oppressed, anti-Black, anti-gay, anti-poor and oppressed in fact damn near anti-the-average citizen of this country. Many are convinced that the Republican party is simply pro-white, pro-corporations, pro-business. I, myself, believe these things, and it isn't as though I am ignorant opf the policies of the Republican Party in Washington. It is also true that the Republicans in Washington have been totally devoted to fomenting Obama's failure at the expense of spending time solving the people's problems. This is amply demonstrated over and over and over in the book I have recommended several times here, "The New New Deal." When you see what happened right after Obama's first election -- and I mean in the first few days, which are described in detail here -- you will see that Republican fervor to stop Obama from achieving anything, including things Republicans had previously favored or proposed was single-minded and at the expense of achieving anything for the electorate. This is all detailed and documented in the book I have mentioned, so please don't take it as my "opinion." It is established, documented fact.
Interesting article, probably valid data (I am not... (
show quote)
Richard, I will do a little digging into "The New New Deal" as you have suggested but things in the political realm are so over blown and propagandized that it really does require research to get to the truth. As I was reading back through these comments and saw a post by a democratic supporter who stated that "Obama just wants to see that we get back what we paid into Medicare and Social Security." The poster obviously does not understand the problem of the debate of the funds finances or funding, so it is easy for him to conclude that the president is calling for fairness and that the republicans are trying to rob from the people... The issue is much deeper than that and it is very unfortunate that many of us are grossly under informed on the biggest issues of the day. The fact is that the trust fund has been spent and although it is true that their is a federal obligation to the trust fund it is also true that any spending from the trust fund's reserve will have to come from new borrowing... People retiring now will draw on the average over three times what they paid in... It is also true that in 1960 there were 5.1 workers paying into the system for each retiree drawing Social Security and Medicare and as soon as 2020 that number will drop to 2.6 or lower if the economy does not fully recover... This means that the share of their paycheck going to support the program at some point will greatly effect their own standard of living and it is very unclear if the younger workers of today will receive the same type benefits that they are paying to their grandparents....
An interesting report government report can be found here...
Another example of low informed voters and how our politicians inform debate is the current push of the administration to end subsidies to oil companies... The president has done a wonderful job of framing that debate from the perspective on the left especially when you consider that there is no such things as subsidies to oil companies! The just receive the same tax treatment as would any producer and in fact the only real subsidies going to energy companies are to the green alternative sources, those are real subsidies, the oil producers get none all the while paying higher tax rates than normal corporations.... here is a little info for you explaining some of this....
Quote:
The truth is that the oil and gas industry receives the same kinds of tax treatments that every other manufacturing or extractive industry receives in the federal tax code. There is nothing uncommon or out of the mainstream of tax treatments about any of the provisions that have been repeatedly proposed for repeal.
1. A great example of just how inaccurate this depiction is applies to Percentage Depletion, which has been a feature of the tax code since 1913. Basically, Percentage Depletion is the oil and gas industrys version of a depreciation deduction for its main asset, which is the oil and natural gas in the ground, commonly known as its reserves. Every industry of any kind is allowed a depreciation deduction on its assets under the U.S. Tax Code, but, far from being a subsidy for big oil, this tax treatment was in fact repealed for all integrated oil companies, i.e., ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, etc., in 1975, and is today available only to independent producers and royalty owners. So repeal of this extremely long-standing, completely common tax treatment would have no effect on big oil at all, and would in fact hit small producers and royalty owners harder than anyone else.
2. Another great example of the specious mischaracterization of these tax treatments is the Manufacturers Tax Deduction, more commonly referred to as Section 199. The Section 199 provision was enacted by congress in 2004 as a means of encouraging manufacturers to relocate overseas jobs to the U.S., and is in no way specific to or limited to the oil and gas industry. In fact, the oil & gas industrys ability to take advantage of this provision has already been singled out for limitation in 2008, Congress reduced the industrys deduction under this provision to 2/3rds of what other manufacturing industries are allowed to deduct.
3. The tax code contains a couple of credits related to the oil and gas industry the Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) Tax Credit, and the Marginal Well Tax Credit. Far from being subsidies to big oil, these tax credits are used almost exclusively by small to mid-size independent producers who tend to become the operators of marginal oil and gas fields as they age and are divested by the larger companies. The EOR credit was implemented in 1990, and the Marginal Well Credit was signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1994.
4. Finally, lets talk about Intangible Drilling Costs (IDCs), another feature of the federal tax code that will enjoy its 100th birthday in 2013. Basically, IDCs are the costs incurred by the oil and gas industry in the drilling of its wells. Since drilling wells is the only means of finding oil and natural gas, IDCs essentially amount to what any other industry would be able to deduct as a part of its cost of goods sold, a concept of accounting and tax law as old as the tax code itself.
Independent producers and royalty owners are allowed an election to either a) expense these costs in the year they are incurred, or b) amortize them over a 5-year period. Again, most media reports commonly characterize this as a subsidy for big oil, as does the Obama Administration. The truth is that big oil the ExxonMobils, Chevrons, Shells and BPs of the world benefit much less from this tax treatment, it having been severely limited to them by congress in 1986, and again in 1992. And the truth also is that IDCs are not a subsidy to anyone engaged in the oil and gas business.
Bottom line: Despite the Administrations rhetoric that has been so widely repeated in the press, the tax treatments in question are not subsidies that are in any way outside of the mainstream of tax treatments commonly available to all U.S. industries. Rather than being mostly a benefit to big oil, the repeal of these and other oil and gas industry-related tax provisions would mainly impact smaller independent producers and royalty owners. Such repeal would serve no legitimate public policy purpose, other than to unfairly discriminate via the tax code against one of the nations most productive albeit easily demonized manufacturing industries.
The truth is that the oil and gas industry receive... (
show quote)
Bottomline Richard, it is hard for people like yourself and I to muddle our way through politics, it seems that we each in our own way cling to the principles that we were raised with and we tend to see the virtues of our political beliefs... I do caution you however that we are both being sold a bill of goods by the political leadership that we support, I see flaws in the leadership of the party I support, I would hope that you see flaws in this president as well, just this report and the article I point you to should give you pause to reevaluate some of the political rhetoric that has dominated issues over the last couple of years... You have little faith in the republicans, you said that earlier, I would hope though that you would take a deeper look into issues to satisfy yourself.... And I can not suggest strongly enough to anybody that they review the 10 year budgets posted on the CBO website so that they can understand for themselves the budgetary issues facing this country.